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Church, Media, CultureTue, 27 Jan 2015 03:32:20 +0000en-UShourly1http://wordpress.org/?v=4.1.1Martin Luther: If we neglect the biblical languages, the gospel will perishhttp://www.pajamapages.com/martin-luther-if-we-neglect-the-biblical-languages-the-gospel-will-perish/
http://www.pajamapages.com/martin-luther-if-we-neglect-the-biblical-languages-the-gospel-will-perish/#commentsTue, 27 Jan 2015 03:32:20 +0000http://www.pajamapages.com/?p=6416read more]]>The following is an excerpt from Martin Luther’s treatise, To the councilmen of all the cities in Germany that they establish and maintain Christian schools, where he predicts what will happen to Christian doctrine when teachers think they can ignore the biblical languages.

Though written 490 years ago, so accurate are its predictions and so contemporary its application that it stands on its own without further commentary. (The excerpt is long, but it’s all good.)

Luther’s Wittenberg

In proportion then as we value the gospel, let us zealously hold to the languages. For it was not without purpose that God caused his Scriptures to be set down in these two languages alone–the Old Testament in Hebrew, the New in Greek. Now if God did not despise them but chose them above all others for his word, then we too ought to honor them above all others….

We will not long preserve the gospel without the languages. The languages are the sheath in which this sword of the Spirit is contained; they are the casket in which this jewel is enshrined; they are the vessel in which this wine is held; they are the larder in which this food is stored; and, as the gospel itself points out, they are the baskets in which are kept these loaves and fishes and fragments….

For this reason even the apostles themselves considered it necessary to set down the New Testament and hold it fast in the Greek language, doubtless in order to preserve it for us there safe and sound as in a sacred ark. For they foresaw all that was to come, and now has come to pass; they knew that if it was left exclusively to men’s memory, wild and fearful disorder and confusion and a host of varied interpretations, fancies, and doctrines would arise in the Christian church, and that this could not be prevented and the simple folk protected unless the New Testament were set down with certainty in written language. Hence, it is inevitable that unless the languages remain, the gospel must finally perish….

The Holy Spirit is no fool. He does not busy himself with inconsequential or useless matters. He regarded the languages as so useful and necessary to Christianity that he ofttimes brought them down with him from heaven. This alone should be a sufficient motive for us to pursue them with diligence and reverence and not to despise them, for he himself has now revived them again upon the earth.

Yes, you say, but many of the fathers were saved and even became teachers without the languages. That is true. But how do you account for the fact that they so often erred in the Scriptures?…

When our faith is thus held up to ridicule, where does the fault lie? It lies in our ignorance of the languages; and there is no other way out than to learn the languages….

There is a vast difference therefore between a simple preacher of the faith and a person who expounds Scripture, or, as St. Paul puts it, a prophet. A simple preacher (it is true) has so many clear passages and texts available through translations that he can know and teach Christ, lead a holy life, and preach to others. But when it comes to interpreting Scripture, and working with it on your own, and disputing with those who cite it incorrectly, he is unequal to the task; that cannot be done without languages. Now there must always be such prophets in the Christian church who can dig into Scripture, expound it, and carry on disputations. A saintly life and right doctrine are not enough. Hence languages are absolutely and altogether necessary in the Christian church, as are the prophets or interpreters; although it is not necessary that every Christian or every preacher be such a prophet, as St. Paul points out in I Corinthians 12 and Ephesians 4….

Since it becomes Christians then to make good use of the Holy Scriptures as their one and only book and it is a sin and a shame not to know our own book or to understand the speech and words of our God, it is a still greater sin and loss that we do not study languages, especially in these days when God is offering and giving us men and books and every facility and inducement to this study, and desires his Bible to be an open book. O how happy the dear fathers would have been if they had had our opportunity to study the languages and come thus prepared to the Holy Scriptures! What great toil and effort it cost them to gather up a few crumbs, while we with half the labor–yes, almost without any labor at all–can acquire the whole loaf! O how their effort puts our indolence to shame! Yes, how sternly God will judge our lethargy and ingratitude!

Here belongs also what St. Paul calls for in I Corinthians 14, namely, that in the Christian church all teachings must be judged. For this a knowledge of the language is needful above all else. The preacher or teacher can expound the Bible from beginning to end as he pleases, accurately or inaccurately, if there is no one there to judge whether he is doing it right or wrong. But in order to judge, one must have a knowledge of the languages; it cannot be done in any other way. Therefore, although faith and the gospel may indeed be proclaimed by simple preachers without a knowledge of languages, such preaching is flat and tame; people finally become weary and bored with it, and it falls to the ground. But where the preacher is versed in the languages, there is a freshness and vigor in his preaching, Scripture is treated in its entirety, and faith finds itself constantly renewed by a continual variety of words and illustrations. Hence, Psalm 129 likens such scriptural studies to a hunt, saying to the deer God opens the dense forests; and Psalm 1 likens them to a tree with a plentiful supply of water, whose leaves are always green….

I can by no means commend the Waldensian Brethren for their neglect of the languages. For even though they may teach the truth, they inevitably often miss the true meaning of the text, and thus are neither equipped nor fit for defending the faith against error. Moreover, their teaching is so obscure and couched in such peculiar terms, differing from the language of Scripture, that I fear it is not or will not remain pure. For there is great danger in speaking of things of God in a different manner and in different terms than God himself employs.

The day after covering the Ten Commandments controversy, a Christian Today reporter stuck the boot into Noble’s critics.

Two days ago, the Christian Today website published an opinion piece from its reporter, Mark Woods, who, the day before, had published a news story to its website about the Ten Commandments sermon and the SC Baptist Convention’s response to the controversy. [The first version of this story incorrectly identified the publication as Christianity Today, which is not affiliated with the site.]

I’m with Perry Noble.

Did he realize this before or after he wrote the apparently objective article about the controversy? As a matter of journalistic ethics, why does Christian Today have its reporters contributing such one-sided opinions while still covering a live and controversial story?

Perry Noble has drawn criticism for his sermon on the 10 Commandments.

There, I’ve said it. Conservative critics have been lining up to put the boot into the South Carolina megachurch pastor after a Christmas Eve sermon in which he appeared to re-interpret the 10 Commandments out of existence, even going so far as to say that they weren’t actually commandments anyway.

Now, I have no dog in this fight. I’m not an apologist for Perry Noble or his ministry,

Yes, he is. This is a defense of, an apology for, Perry Noble. This type of article is exactly what apologists do.

and I have no particular beef with conservative Christians who’ve criticised him.

Yes, he does, and he especially lines up to put the boot into Noble’s critics at the conclusion of his piece.

But what bothers me about the condemnation he’s faced is this: the assumption that biblical truth looks like one thing and one thing only, and the sense of betrayal evidenced when someone breaks from the party line.

Noble’s observation that the 10 Commandments weren’t actually labelled as such is warped into Noble saying that you don’t have to keep them: it’s OK to lie, steal and commit adultery. Is that what he believes? No, though you’d never think it judging by the outbreak of moral panic.

It’s not a warp. Noble actually said that you don’t have to keep them, and it’s documented here, though that may explain why Woods didn’t link to this blog.

Could that observation lead someone to lie, steal or commit adultery when they wouldn’t have done so previously? The chances are vanishingly small, wouldn’t you think?

If Woods lived in Anderson, or in any South Carolina city with a NewSpring campus, he might be surprised at how easy it would be for him to find a NewSpringer who is comfortable living in some form of sinful lifestyle. Noble’s “meh” attitude towards sexual sin almost certainly does lead to much more sin than if he emphasized the law and sanctification. Noble’s constant criticism of other churches as legalistic is based on his accusation that they do not tolerate sexual sins the same why that NewSpring does. (To be clear, I’m not saying this tolerance for sin is manifested in all or even most NewSpringers, just enough that it’s noticed by many South Carolinians with NewSpring friends.)

– and anyway, I thought we didn’t do the right thing just because we’re told to, but because we love God.

The Commandments apply to everybody, even if they hate God. We obey because we love the lawgiver who told us to do so.

Then look at what he’s actually said. “You shall have no other gods before me” becomes “You do not have to live in constant disappointment any more.” That’s frankly a bit of an exegetical stretch, but you can see where he’s going.

It’s exegetical vandalism, not just stretching.

We don’t need to see where Noble is going, because he told us before he started: Nonbelievers do not need to obey the commandments. That’s his launching point and his destination.

“You shall not make a graven image” becomes “You can be free from rituals and religion and trust in a relationship.” A bit more defensible, that one. “Remember the Sabbath day, to keep it holy” becomes “You can rest.” That one is entirely reasonable.

And so on. The point is that all of these commandments invite questions and require interpretation in the light of today. If they don’t get that, they become dead letters.

Nobody on our side of the debate thinks they are dead letters at all. Only someone who thinks they’re dead assumes for himself the privilege of updating them.

Frankly, I cannot remember the last time I was tempted to bow down before a graven image and I don’t even know anyone with an ox I could covet.

Frankly, Woods doesn’t understand the Ten Commandments and their role in Scripture. The Commandments function as a form of constitutional law, the unchangeable legal fundamentals upon which every other law is built.

Let’s say that we wanted to have Woods’ article censored. He would appeal to the First Amendment to protect his right to publish, and he’d be right. But I could counter that the First Amendment only grants freedom of the “press,” and because this is on the Internet it doesn’t use the press so it’s not protected. He’d argue that the right of a free press is a fundamental constitutional right that protects all journalistic expression regardless of the method of production, which is correct. The same principle applies to the timeless Commandments.

Another criticism Noble has faced is his use of “coarse and profane language” – possibly referring to an evident use of the n-word in his Christmas eve sermon, though he has form in this respect. Well: I am not relaxed about that. The word offends me, and I think if he did use it (there’s some doubt) he shouldn’t have.

Woods needs to tell us whether he actually thinks Noble used the word, especially because the next part of the argument is defending Noble’s intemperate language use. If he didn’t say it, move on; the issue is dead. If he did, how would he defend it?

However, I am completely relaxed about language which is not of the drawing-room standard if a) It’s genuinely part of the pastor’s personality and is the kind of language the congregation is comfortable with (I do not move in such circles myself);

So the pastor’s personality has free reign to foul up the proclamation of God’s word? Preachers have a sacred duty to proclaim God’s word as if they were delivering it from God’s very mouth, and, to the best that they’re able, they really ought to make their personality as small and muted as possible when they’re preaching.

or, b) It’s making a serious point. For instance, at a Christian convention the evangelist and social activist Tony Campolo once said: “First while you were sleeping last night, 30,000 kids died of starvation or diseases related to malnutrition. Second, most of you don’t give a sh*t. What’s worse is that you’re more upset with the fact that I said sh*t than the fact that 30,000 kids died last night.” Result.

If you can’t make a serious point without cussing, you shouldn’t be in the business of making serious points.

(The other reason I’m relaxed about it is because I’ve read Church history. How would Noble’s delicate critics fare if they were had to listen to Martin Luther, for instance, who famously described the Pope as “a turd squeezed from the Devil’s arse”?)

Delicate? We haven’t made a big deal of the n-word incident, treating it as a secondary issue compared to the Commandments teaching, though I’m not sure if Woods thinks we should have just ignored his use of the n-word?

Christian Today uses a quote from Martin Luther that can only be found at its site.

Wood’s famous Luther quote has escaped the attention of Google, which finds it only in Woods’ article. (Woods may have created his imagined quote based on a quote attributed to Luther where he himself is the turd.) Nevertheless, if you’re going to appeal to Luther for language, why not also for arguing doctrine? The quote Woods thought he found was of Luther criticizing a church leader for his fundamental flaws in proclaiming law and grace. Can’t we critics appeal to the oft-critical Luther as a model, too?

These criticisms worry me, not because I think they’ll damage Noble – who doesn’t seem to let them bother him – but because of the mindset that might lie behind them. That mindset puts the adherence to a theological purity and doctrinal correctness defined by a particular sub-tribe of evangelical Protestants before anything else.

It isn’t a sub-tribe, it’s all of Christianity, and the perpetual force of the Ten Commandments unites all three major tribes (Protestant, Catholic and Orthodox). Noble would have us believe that this is a complicated debate, but it has never been. See this post for an example of how uniform Christian teaching has been on the Commandments.

But here’s the thing: that’s not what I want from a sermon. I want someone with flair and imagination, someone who’ll take risks and go off-piste.

Off-piste means to ski off the marked ski trails. A pathway to quick disaster, in other words.

I want someone who’ll speak without notes and enter into an emotional and dramatic relationship with the congregation. I don’t mind if they aren’t “right” about something.

Fortunately, Woods isn’t the standard. The Bible is the standard, and, as the Bereans demonstrated, right preaching can be carefully evaluated and proved to be right or wrong. Those of us in these parts of the interweb call it discernment.

I have a Bible, I can read it myself.

Prove it.

Did he read Paul’s admonitions to Timothy about being a careful and disciplined preacher? Did he read the warnings about preachers who would twist Scripture to create emotional dramatic relationships with listeners with itching ears?

Because I don’t believe that preaching and Bible teaching are the same thing. If Perry Noble wrote a set of study notes saying that his version of the commandments was better than the Bible one, I’d worry. If he says in a sermon, “This is what ‘You shall not steal’ means today, and it’s not what you £**@?* thought,” I’m fine with that – because there’s a preacher who’s not parroting something from a book or retailing second-hand ideas, but telling me what he thinks.

He should be concerned that Noble gets it right in both contexts, but if he’s going to get one wrong, it should be the one that’s written, where a reader has a chance to objectively analyze and think about what has been written. An audience in a live speech or sermon cannot as intently evaluate a message as a reader can. This entire debate proves the point. Thousands of NewSpringers heard Noble’s sermon and didn’t think much, if anything, wrong with it. When Rosebrough and I started putting it in a printed form a week later, people immediately saw the problem.

Martyn Lloyd-Jones famously described preaching as “logic on fire”. Ideally there’d be both: but if I have to choose, give me the fire and I’ll supply the logic for myself.

A fire with logic is a furnace. Without logic, it’s is a wild fire.

What are Noble’s critics so afraid of? That someone, one Sunday, might actually say something new or interesting?

Preachers who preach new truth disqualify themselves. Their primary job is to teach old truth faithfully because that truth is always interesting and always lively.

And if so, what does that say about them?

That we love and defend old lively truth.

]]>http://www.pajamapages.com/fisking-christianity-todays-defense-of-perry-noble/feed/17An NFL quarterback and the SCBC president rebuke NewSpring. The story of what happened next.http://www.pajamapages.com/an-nfl-quarterback-and-the-scbc-president-rebuke-newspring-the-story-of-what-happened-next/
http://www.pajamapages.com/an-nfl-quarterback-and-the-scbc-president-rebuke-newspring-the-story-of-what-happened-next/#commentsWed, 21 Jan 2015 05:07:03 +0000http://www.pajamapages.com/?p=6334read more]]>NewSpring faced two public relations crises last week, and its response to each tells us much about the church’s lack of accountability and unwillingness to submit to correction.

On Friday morning, the South Carolina Baptist Convention published a strong and detailed rebuke of the NewSpring’s pastor, worship style and governance. The statement by the SCBC president, Pastor Tommy Kelly, asked every Baptist church in South Carolina to publicly distance itself from NewSpring. Five days later, neither Noble nor the church has even publicly acknowledged the SCBC’s message.

NewSpring’s “children bouncers” kept an NFL quarterback’s family from entering its service last Sunday.

Last Sunday morning, Connor Shaw, the former USC Gamecocks quarterback and current Cleveland Browns backup quarterback, tried to attend a NewSpring service with his family, but found that NewSpring’s “children bouncers” (their term) prohibited his children from entering the auditorium with him. He wasn’t impressed, and said so on Twitter:

I’ve written about NewSpring’s family-dividing worship before, so for now I’m most interested in the contrasting responses to these two public complaints. A serious rebuke from the president of their own denomination was ignored, though they publicly engaged with a sports celebrity within minutes.

By NewSpring’s silence regarding the SCBC rebuke, the church is telling the world that it really doesn’t care what the church at large thinks of it. Noble is showing the same insolence to authority that his friend Mark Driscoll demonstrated just a few months ago. Driscoll led a church that, while not affiliated with an external governing denomination, had an internal accountability structure that investigated a variety of charges brought against Driscoll by former elders and pastors in his church. At the conclusion of their investigation, the Mars Hill board asked Driscoll to fix some of the problems that they had identified. In a move that surprised the board, Driscoll responded by resigning and leaving the church, which consequently dissolved as an organization at the end of 2014.

Driscoll’s first public appearance after resigning from Mars Hill was at a conference with Steven Furtick and Robert Morris (who is often used to preach NewSpring’s fundraising sermons). After Morris let Driscoll publicly portray himself as the victim of an unfair process, Noble praised Morris for supporting Driscoll.

When Driscoll was about to be properly and gently corrected (they could have fired him) by his own church, Noble, Morris and Furtick abandoned the congregation that Driscoll had left behind at Mars Hill. Instead of telling Driscoll to go back to Seattle and deal with his sin, they praised his unwillingness to submit to correction. Instead of supporting church discipline, they railed against it, and now that church no longer exists.

Driscoll actually had an easier path to restoration than Noble and NewSpring do. Most of the problems with Driscoll were related to his abusive leadership style, not his preaching and teaching. In NewSpring’s case, the SC Baptist Convention is asking for correction in NewSpring’s government structure, its worship style, and Noble’s preaching style, content and very doctrine. In other words, everything that makes Noble Noble and NewSpring NewSpring.

If Noble were to humbly submit to the Convention’s correction, his church would be unrecognizable from what it is today, which is why the church cannot afford to even acknowledge the rebuke. To be healed, NewSpring would have to die to itself, and its pastor appears unwilling to let that happen.

The official publication of the South Carolina Baptist Convention carried a public rebuke of Noble and NewSpring

The South Carolina Baptist Convention has told Perry Noble and NewSpring that they must correct serious errors in their church before they can once again associate with the Convention. In a bold and praiseworthy statement, the president of the SCBC, Tommy Kelly, turned what has been general public criticism of NewSpring into official church discipline, though the public rebuke went much further than just the Ten Commandments sermon. Kelly condemned Noble’s pulpit profanity, his sloppy exegesis and preaching, his lack of accountability and inability to receive correction. It also criticized NewSpring’s regular use of anti-christian music in its services.

After Noble’s persistent defense of his error and his obvious antipathy towards the Baptist Convention, it’s hard to see this public rebuke making much difference inside the executive offices at NewSpring. Instead, this is really a warning for everyone else. Kelly instructed every Baptist church in South Carolina to publicly state the truth regarding Noble’s teaching and remove themselves from being associated with NewSpring.

The statement appears to concede that the Convention has already separated itself from NewSpring, and it demands that NewSpring must correct its positions on worship, doctrine, accountability and biblical scholarship before the church is again permitted to associate itself with the Convention. That the statement was made publicly suggests that Kelly doesn’t think it’s going to happen.

It’s highly unlikely that a denominational leader would publicly ambush one of his own churches with something so serious, so I think it’s certain that Kelly has already talked to Noble privately about the denomination’s concerns. For Kelly to have gone public suggests that Noble rejected his correction quickly and unequivocally, with Noble understanding that the consequences would be expulsion from the Convention. On Thursday afternoon Noble tweeted, “Pressure is nothing more than a call to humility!” The statement, which didn’t seem to fit any particular flow of thought in his Twitter feed, was likely his response to Kelly’s warnings. Noble and Kelly probably spoke for the last time on Thursday afternoon. Kelly’s announcement was published in the Convention’s official newspaper and website on Friday morning.

Over the last week, Noble’s Tweets have indicated that he is not willing to be corrected, and he resents it that other Christians are still criticizing him. Here’s a sequence from the last few days:

Unless a person is willing to be misunderstood they will never make a difference. (Jan 13)

The world would be a good place if sinners repented of sin. The world would be an AMAZING place if religious people repented of religion! (Jan 14)

Get that? Religious people are more harmful to the world than sinners. If you didn’t know that his man was a pastor, would you assume he wanted to be identified as a member of Christ’s church?

I think Kelly knows in his heart that Noble is gone for good, so he’s doing the right thing as a faithful leader in God’s church to warn others not to associate with Noble or his church. Assuming the separation is a permanent one, how might this affect NewSpring?

NewSpringers

Many will be surprised that NewSpring is even associated with the Southern Baptists, so discovering that they’ve lost that affiliation won’t matter much. Though some have already left over the Commandments sermon, if they’ve stood with Noble through his obvious error, they’ll probably stand with him through a denominational rebuke, too.

Noble

Noble will probably be relieved to be done with the Baptists as a denomination, with whom his connection springs primarily from their $20,000 investment in NewSpring’s founding. Noble has announced that he has paid that investment back (with 3 percent annualized interested added), so he probably assumes he has no further obligation to them.

It’s possible this affects his future publishing efforts. In late December Noble announced that he submitted the manuscript for his third book, though it remains to be seen whether any publisher is willing to take a risk on him now that he has built a reputation for embracing obvious error to the point of being disavowed by his own denomination. Noble’s publisher, Tyndale House, is under intense pressure at the moment for knowingly publishing factually false and biblically unsound books. Mark Driscoll’s next book was put on indefinite hold by Tyndale when he was engulfed in scandal last year, so it’s not a stretch to see that happening to Noble as well. As NewSpring’s dependance on Result Source demonstrated, there’s not a huge market (that’s not on NewSpring’s payroll) that’s anxiously waiting for Noble’s next book.

NewSpring Staff

The example of Mark Driscoll’s departure from Mars Hill Church and its almost immediate implosion must have a few NewSpring staffers concerned. How long can Noble continue his duties as a pastor if he stubbornly clings to obvious heresy? How does NewSpring survive if he walks away? It would be reassuring to see a few staff leave as a matter of principle, though there might be a few who are seeing the writing on the wall and are quietly freshening their resumes.

Fuse

NewSpring’s mid-week youth ministry attracts many youth from other churches, even though they return to their parents’ church on Sundays. Once parents discover that NewSpring’s own denomination is warning people to stay away, will they continue to allow their children to be a part of it, especially if they attend SCBC churches on Sunday?

NewSpring College

The college promises to prepare its students for church work, and most probably plan to stay with NewSpring. Smart students should be tracking Noble’s recent doctrinal trajectory and thinking about where he’ll be (both doctrinally and physically) in two years. If they do stick it out, will other Baptist churches place much stock in a diploma from a church that has just been expelled from their denomination?

Clayton King

Best I can tell, NewSpring’s official teaching pastor has been silent on the controversy. Does he agree with his NewSpring boss? Dare he say anything if he doesn’t? King’s main vocation is as an itinerant preacher to small and mid-sized Baptist churches, many of which also send their young children and teens to his summer camps. Will parents balk at trusting their children’s spiritual growth to a leader who is so closely affiliated with Noble and NewSpring?

A denominational leader like Kelly, who is willing to defend biblical authority at the cost of losing the denomination’s largest church, is an admirable example of integrity and leadership.

Noble wrote a letter to his church apologizing for a small part of his Christmas Eve sermon

Late last week, Noble published a letter to his church that looked like he was apologizing for the sermon, though a careful reading shows that the apology was very limited, and the important theological problems created by the sermon were not only retained, but embraced. As I noted in a previous post, I wanted to give Noble the benefit of the doubt, so I contacted him privately to offer him the opportunity to clarify it in case I was missing something. NewSpring’s response was clear: he didn’t want to explain anything else, so at this point it’s not only fair, but important, to analyze the apology and the continuing theological disaster that is NewSpring’s Christmas Eve sermon.

To review quickly, Noble claimed that there was no word in Hebrew for command, which led to the main premise of the sermon that there weren’t really any Ten Commandments. My response, which was confirmed by many others who also critiqued the sermon, was that he was wrong on both counts. Denying the commandments was by far the worst part of the sermon, though the first claim about the Hebrew word was so obviously wrong that it hardly needed refutation.

Noble’s apology retracts nothing that wasn’t already obvious to us all. Let’s analyze it a little.

So I did this sermon on the Ten Commandments once and everyone loved it…

How many people loved it isn’t the standard that Noble should be using to measure his work. Was it faithful to Scripture? Was it true? Paul tells Timothy to preach the Word even out of season (2 Tim 4:2), indicating that there would be times when people would neither love nor respond to his preaching, even though good and right.

If by everyone Noble includes the leadership of his church, that’s troubling in itself. Did anyone on staff detect a problem with his message, and, if so, did anyone have the opportunity to confront Noble with corrective criticism? This blog didn’t publish anything about the sermon for more than a week afterwards, so there was plenty of quiet before the controversy hit for NewSpring’s internal governance structures to have fixed or anticipated this.

Before I give finality to this issue (it’s time to move on) I want to address a few things first.

#1 – I am imperfect. I make mistakes and fall way short of who I should be each and every day.

#2 – I fully understand and feel the weight of James 3:1 that clearly says that people who teach God’s Word will be judged more strictly.

Why, then, the antagonism towards people who do critique his preaching? A few days before the apology, he boasted to other pastors that through this controversy he was bravely taking a hit for Jesus, favorably comparing himself to the suffering Christ.

#3 – I take teaching the Bible very seriously and desperately want to always put forth my best effort as I really do believe that when God says “don’t” in Scripture it is more like Him saying, “don’t hurt yourself,” because, as a friend of mine often says, “choose to sin, choose to suffer.”

This mind-blowing paragraph showcases much of what’s wrong with Noble’s preaching. After asserting that he takes the Bible seriously and gives it his best effort, he proceeds to paraphrase it beyond recognition on the authority of a friend. Look at that line again: “when God says ‘don’t’ in Scripture it is more like Him saying, ‘don’t hurt yourself.'” How inconsiderate of the Holy Spirit to have expressed himself so carelessly in the original manuscripts, and how fortunate that we have Perry Noble now to clarify–mainly, to soften–what God said.

That being said I want to go back for a minute, try to shed some light on a couple of things and then make two apologies.

“That being said” is rather important. Noble has demonstrated his habit of arbitrarily rewriting Scripture to make it say what he thinks it should say, so from here it’s no surprise where the apology goes.

On Christmas Eve I really did feel The Lord pressing into me to do a different message than we had previously done in the days before. I wrestled with this for several hours before finally saying “yes.”

Noble doesn’t apologize for the false claim that he heard from God. Even if you think God does give people messages like this, you have to disqualify this one because God surely wouldn’t have asked Noble to proclaim such a huge error. The claim that God told him to preach this message has made it practically impossible for Noble to retract and properly apologize for the sermon. To do so would be to acknowledge that he can be wrong about his claims of divine revelation that are an important source of his authority within the church.

A quick point about hearing from God while we’re here. Noble reports that after hearing God speak to him, he wrestled with the revelation and asked his entire leadership team to confirm that it was God’s voice. It is interesting that the Bible nowhere tells us how to recognize when we’re hearing direct messages from God, yet we know that God did reveal himself to the men who wrote the Scripture. We don’t know exactly how that happened because the Holy Spirit didn’t tell us, though when God spoke to his prophets and apostles, they knew without a shadow of a doubt and didn’t need to poll their associates.

Instead of giving us advice on how to hear from God, Scripture gives plenty of advice on how to test the claims of people who say they heard from God. If God spoke to you, you wouldn’t need to test it, but we always need to test the people who say God spoke to them.

As I began writing down what I felt like He wanted me to say, I began to reflect on the teaching I have received while in Israel and how I had been told there was no Hebrew word for “command,” but that the 10 commandments were actually then ten sayings or the promises of God.

This set my heart on fire and I put the message together, believing it was from the Lord, and we saw over 200 people come to Christ as a result.

Noble’s heart, which like all of ours is sick and deceitful (Jer 17:9), told him that this was an excellent message. The important question is why the erroneous message so inflamed him.

As for the 200 people, they are why this is so important. Our argument is that Noble did not preach the gospel on Christmas Eve, so it’s not a useful defense to point to people who took an action (signing their name on a badge) that Noble claims represents their salvation. If the gospel wasn’t preached, by what means were they saved? Perhaps NewSpring’s pastors have contacted each one of the 200 and presented the true gospel to them, though if so, it would be proper and encouraging to see that mentioned in the apology.

And then it hit the fan!

Actually, before it hit the fan I had reached out to Noble with a private encouragement to fix the Ten Commandments problem quickly. His apology could have come well before the social media tsunami hit, and before he had twice more reaffirmed the sermon (here and here). I had published the original article on Thursday, Jan 1, and received the brief statement from NewSpring on the morning of Jan 2 that I appended to the first article: “We do stand by the message Perry gave to our church on December 24, 2015, and we do believe the Lord prompted Perry to deliver it as he did.” By that stage, the post hadn’t been read or shared by many, possibly because this blog had been dormant since the beginning of August, and I hadn’t written anything about NewSpring since April. Traffic was very light. On Friday afternoon, I sent my contact at NewSpring the following plea:

I’d suggest that Perry finds a way to gracefully back away from the commandments sermon. It’s pretty obvious to most observers, I think, that the claim is wrong (you can’t read far into the OT without seeing that word, so how does he explain what the underlying Hebrew is?). As I wrote in my post, I think he misunderstood a point about the Torah not labelling the Exodus and Deuteronomy passages as “The Ten Commandments,” which is indeed something that came later. Even so, everything on those lists is a commandment, which is what Perry erroneously denied.

The Ten Commandments are obviously a central part of the Bible and, therefore, of Christianity. Perry is quickly going to become known as someone who has disavowed them, and that reputation will be isolating, damaging and memorable. The mistake is explainable (he can even blame the 10-minutes of prep time, as he has already done in the preface to the sermon), so the faster he comes out with a retraction and apology, the better, I think. If he’s going to dig in on it, he’s going to be clinging to something that is obviously heretical, yet that I don’t think he really believes.

I’d rather Perry get it right and set the record straight than for him (and those of you associated with him) to be embarrassed by such a big and serious error.

If he does it, I think you’ll find that his critics will praise him (I will), not kick him. If he doesn’t, he’s going to be criticized on this for a long, long time.

The commandments teaching is a much bigger deal than the N-word thing and something that he can fix honorably and look good in the process.

The response to this was the statement from the pulpit a few days later, both affirming the message and characterizing his critics as angry and mean. The purpose of reproducing my message to Noble is to show that well before it hit the fan, Noble had the opportunity to forestall all of this. It was the day after this message to Noble that the post went viral.

Back to Noble’s apology:

I had no idea that I had stepped into a debate in which godly people are on both sides of the issue.

This isn’t a debate. The Christian church has always recognized that the Commandments are essential to the gospel and has always condemned teachers who attempt to preach grace without law. This post pulled together some examples of a diverse range of godly people who would be surprised that Noble thinks this is even an issue.

I have been on the phone, on the internet and on my face this week trying my hardest to see if what I preached in that message was true, as well as seeing if I made mistakes in that teaching.

Which leads to my two apologies.

#1 – I apologize for saying there was not an actual Hebrew word for command.

In way more research than I have ever done I realized that statement was not correct. (The original Hebrew is “metzaveh”.) In no way was I deliberately trying to mislead or deceive anyone. I simply recalled a conversation I had (which I now see I did not fully understand), looked back at my notes and taught the message. I now realize I should have put way more time into doing research before making that statement.

On one hand, it’s encouraging that Noble did listen to criticism and respond to it. This paragraph in the apology represents the only meaningful retraction from the sermon, though he’s simply acknowledging what many of us knew immediately: of course Hebrew has a word for command, otherwise most of the Old Testament would vanish into the air.

Although he now realizes he should have done more research, he’s not taking responsibility for the incompetence displayed in how he prepared, delivered, and even responded to criticism of this sermon. What will change now? What measures will he implement to ensure this doesn’t happen again?

However, what I am not apologizing for is saying that the Hebrew word for “command” is not used when the 10 commandments were given.

At first glance the lower-case c in commandments looks accidental until you realize the the entire statement is again denying that the Ten Commandments are a legitimate biblical concept. Noble is still insisting that there is no such thing as the Ten Commandments.

It literally means “sayings” – and, according to Exodus 34:28, can also be interpreted as promises.

Not according to Ex 34. It’s only according to his friends that it can be interpreted that way. Here, Noble is being either deliberately deceitful in his handling of Scripture or inexplicably careless with it. Here’s what Ex 34:28 says:

So he was there with the LORD forty days and forty nights. He neither ate bread nor drank water. And he wrote on the tablets the words of the covenant, the Ten Commandments.

The Hebrew word behind the English Commandments in this verse is dabar, meaning word. This is the basis for Noble’s claim that the commandments are just ten words, but the only way that you could claim that they’re promises is if you reason that word means promise. But I could argue that words can also be jokes, so they are really the Ten Jokes, or the Ten Curses, or the Ten Prepositions. Or whatever else kind of thing a word could be.

Though you might want to say that dabar gives you license to substitute anything you want in its place, the context of Scripture forbids it. The listings of the Ten Commandments are found in Exodus 20 and Deuteronomy 5, so someone reading Exodus from start to finish would have learned about the Commandments in Chapter 20. That means that when we get to Chapter 34, Moses is summarizing events that have already been revealed in explicit detail earlier. The ten words in Chapter 34 point us back to what we already learned from Chapter 20–they are the Ten Commandments written by God’s hand.

Let’s say I told you that Payton Manning threw two touchdowns in the first half of a game and another three touchdowns in the second half. After telling you a bit more about the game, I mention that Manning’s “five scores” were the most he’d had in a game this year. Would you be free to assume that he’d scored five goals, five baskets, or five runs? Of course not. The context of the account constrains you to interpret scores only one way: they were touchdowns.

As a friend from Israel shared with me…
“The word command, as well as commandment, is used to translate the Hebrew word mits’vah but does not properly convey the meaning of mits’vah. The word command implies words of force or power as a General commands his troops. The word mits’vah is better understood as a directive. To see the picture painted by this word it is helpful to look at a related word, tsiyon meaning a desert or a landmark. The Ancient Hebrews were a nomadic people who traveled the deserts in search of green pastures for their flocks. A nomad uses the various rivers, mountains, rock outcroppings, etc as landmarks to give them their direction. The verb form of mits’vah is tsavah meaning to direct one on a journey. The mits’vah of the Bible are not commands, or rules and regulations, they are directives or landmarks that we look for to guide us.”

Benjamin Shaw did a good job of dismantling this yesterday, so if you still suspect this is a sound argument Noble’s making, I recommend his post. Noble continues…

However, regardless of what Bible scholars and Hebrew speaking Christians in Israel believe the list of God’s 10 points in Exodus…

Again with Noble’s refusal to recognize them as Commandments.

…should be called (I have heard conflicting positions), the points themselves are clearly written as imperatives—“You shall…you shall not….” I did not, and would never deny that!

He did deny that. He told parents they were wrong to teach their children that there was a biblical imperative to obey them, and he told nonbelievers that “instead of Ten Commandments that you have to keep if you’re going to be a follower of Jesus, they’re actually ten promises.” According to Noble, they are not imperatives to obey, only promises.

The reality of it all is that all of us have broken all ten commands.

Again, he will not call them the Ten Commandments. This is careful and repeated biblical rebellion.

The Old Testament was not given to us to show us how awesome we are, but how sinful we are and how much we all need a Savior.

Yes! This is correct, but what in the Old Testament shows us that we are sinners needing a Savior? The Ten Commandments. If you eliminate them, there’s no sin and no Savior.

None of us are perfect.

All of us fall short of God’s standards for our lives.

All of us need Jesus.

My desire in sharing this message was to point people to Christ. And, it’s so awesome as I reflect back on this and know that even though I said an inaccurate statement…

Noble frames this as a minor mistake, just an inaccurate statement. The problem is that his inaccurate statement that there was no word for command led to a sermon that rescinded the Ten Commandments, and that’s the wider lesson that he continues to promote.

…to know what Paul said in I Corinthians 1:21 is true.

“For since in the wisdom of God the world through its wisdom did not know him, God was pleased through the foolishness of what was preached to save those who believe.”

What Paul said is indeed true, but not in the way that Noble is using it here to justify his foolish preaching. The foolishness is the preaching of the cross, through which Christ becomes our righteousness, our sanctification and our redemption.

If there are no commandments, Jesus cannot be said to be righteous for keeping them perfectly.

If we have broken no commandments, there’s nothing to be sanctified from.

If there is no penalty for breaking the commandments, there’s nothing to be redeemed from.

The Christmas Eve sermon was, and continues to be, a theological disaster. In other spheres of life, people or corporations associated with accidents and disasters do more than just look at the damage and issue a limited and late apology. They fix the damage then try to figure out what conditions caused the problem. Perhaps this is happening behind the scenes at NewSpring, though Noble’s insistence that this is the last time he will talk about it suggests this is a closed issue for him.

Given that there are other pastors like Noble and many others who want to be like him, it’s important to think about how this happened. Even if Noble won’t listen (and we still hope he will), this episode might serve as a warning to other preachers, and, just as importantly, to other Christians who see similar things happening in their churches.

]]>http://www.pajamapages.com/an-analysis-of-nobles-unrepentant-apology/feed/32What has the church taught about the Ten Commandments?http://www.pajamapages.com/what-has-the-church-taught-about-the-ten-commandments/
http://www.pajamapages.com/what-has-the-church-taught-about-the-ten-commandments/#commentsSat, 10 Jan 2015 17:44:06 +0000http://www.pajamapages.com/?p=6224read more]]>In the last week or so, we’ve been focusing on Perry Noble’s teaching on the Ten Commandments, but perhaps this is an opportune time to remind ourselves what the church has taught through the centuries about the Commandments. I’ll kick it off with a few quotes, but please use the comments to add more (with links to the original material if possible), some of which I’ll copy into the main post.

Note: This isn’t about Noble or me, and I’m not here asserting that we disagree over any the following statements. This is intended as an encouragement to the body of Christ by showing the remarkable unity that has characterized the church’s teachings about the commandments over the centuries.

Augustine (412)

The law, indeed, by issuing its commands and threats, and by justifying no man, sufficiently shows that it is by God’s gift, through the help of the Spirit, that a man is justified…. Our will is by the law shown to be weak, that grace may heal its infirmity. (Of the Spirit and the Letter)

It is necessary that we should be led by the fear of God to seek the knowledge of His will, what He commands us to desire and what to avoid…. Next it is necessary to have our hearts subdued by piety, and not to run in the face of Holy Scripture, whether when understood it strikes at some of our sins, or, when not understood, we feel as if we could be wiser and give better commands ourselves. (On Christian Doctrine. Book 2, Ch 7.)

Martin Luther (1529)

God threatens to punish all that transgress these commandments. Therefore we should dread His wrath and not act contrary to these commandments. But He promises grace and every blessing to all that keep these commandments. Therefore we should also love and trust in Him, and gladly do [zealously and diligently order our whole life] according to His commandments. (Small Catechism)

Now, there is comprehended in these words (as said before) both an angry word of threatening and a friendly promise to terrify and warn us, and, moreover to induce and encourage us to receive and highly esteem His Word as a matter of divine earnestness, because He Himself declares how much He is concerned about it, and how rigidly He will enforce it, namely, that He will horribly and terribly punish all who despise and transgress His commandments; and again, how richly He will reward, bless, and do all good to those who hold them in high esteem, and gladly do and live according to them. Thus He demands that all our works proceed from a heart which fears and regards God alone, and from such fear avoids everything that is contrary to His will, lest it should move Him to wrath; and, on the other hand, also trusts in Him alone, and from love to Him does all He wishes, because he speaks to us as friendly as a father, and offers us all grace and every good. (Large Catechism)

John Calvin (1559)

In the precepts of the law, God is but the rewarder of perfect righteousness, which all of us lack, and conversely, the severe judge of evil deeds. But in Christ his face shines, full of grace and gentleness, even upon us poor and unworthy sinners….

[In Psalm 119, David] lays hold not only of the precepts, but the accompanying promise grace, which alone sweetens what is bitter. For what would be less lovable than the law if, with importuning and threatening alone, it troubled souls through fear, and distressed them through fright? David especially shows that in the law he apprehended the Mediator, without whom there is no delight or sweetness….

The law is not now acting toward us as a rigorous enforcement officer who is not satisfied unless the requirements are met. But in this perfection to which it exhorts us, the law points out the goal toward which throughout life we are to strive. (Institutes, II.VII.8, 12, 13)

Second Helvetic Confession (1562)

We teach that this law was not given to men that they might be justified by keeping it, but that rather from what it teaches we may know (our) weakness, sin and condemnation, and, despairing of our strength, might be converted to Christ in faith. (XII)

Thirty-Nine Articles (1563)

The Old Testament is not contrary to the New: for both in the Old and New Testament everlasting life is offered to Mankind by Christ, who is the only Mediator between God and Man, being both God and Man. Wherefore they are not to be heard, which feign that the old Fathers did look only for transitory promises. Although the Law given from God by Moses, as touching Ceremonies and Rites, do not bind Christian men, nor the Civil precepts thereof ought of necessity to be received in any commonwealth; yet notwithstanding, no Christian man whatsoever is free from the obedience of the Commandments which are called Moral. (Of the Old Testament)

Heidelberg Catechism (1563)

Q3. How do you come to know your misery?

A. The law of God tells me.

Q9. But doesn’t God do us an injustice by requiring in his law what we are unable to do?

A. No, God created human beings with the ability to keep the law. They, however, provoked by the devil, in willful disobedience, robbed themselves and all their descendants of these gifts.

Q10. Does God permit such disobedience and rebellion to go unpunished?

A. Certainly not. God is terribly angry with the sin we are born with as well as the sins we personally commit.

As a just judge, God will punish them both now and in eternity, having declared: “Cursed is everyone who does not observe and obey all the things written in the book of the law.”

Q11. But isn’t God also merciful?

A. God is certainly merciful, but also just. God’s justice demands that sin, committed against his supreme majesty, be punished with the supreme penalty—eternal punishment of body and soul. (Part 1: Misery)

Q15. What kind of mediator and deliverer should we look for then?

A. One who is a true and righteous human, yet more powerful than all creatures, that is, one who is also true God.

Westminster Confession of Faith (1646)

The moral law does forever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof; and that, not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator, who gave it. Neither does Christ, in the Gospel, any way dissolve, but much strengthen this obligation. (XIX, V)

Baptist Confession of Faith (1689)

The moral law does for ever bind all, as well justified persons as others, to the obedience thereof, and that not only in regard of the matter contained in it, but also in respect of the authority of God the Creator, who gave it; neither does Christ in the Gospel any way dissolve, but much strengthen this obligation. (XIX, V)

Johnathan Edwards (1741)

They are already under a sentence of condemnation to hell. They do not only justly deserve to be cast down thither, but the sentence of the law of God, that eternal and immutable rule of righteousness that God has fixed between him and mankind, is gone out against them, and stands against them; so that they are bound over already to hell. John 3:18. “He that believeth not is condemned already.” So that every unconverted man properly belongs to hell; that is his place; from thence he is, John 8:23. “Ye are from beneath:” And thither he is bound; it is the place that justice, and God’s word, and the sentence of his unchangeable law assign to him….

And now you have an extraordinary opportunity, a day wherein Christ has thrown the door of mercy wide open, and stands in calling and crying with a loud voice to poor sinners; a day wherein many are flocking to him, and pressing into the kingdom of God…. Therefore, let every one that is out of Christ, now awake and fly from the wrath to come. (Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God)

Charles Spurgeon (1886)

The law of the ten commandments is strictly just; it is such a law as a man might make for himself if he studied his own best interests, and had wisdom enough to frame it aright. It is a perfect law, in which the interests of God and man are both studied; it is not a partial law, but impartial, complete, and covering all the circumstances of life. You could not take away one command out of the ten without spoiling both tables of the law, and you could not add another command without being guilty of making a superfluity. The law is holy, and just, and good; it is like the God who made it, it is a perfect law. Then, surely, it ought to have been kept. When men revolt against unjust laws, they are to be commended; but when a law is admitted to be perfect, then disobedience to it is an act of exceeding guilt….

Alas! notwithstanding all these solemn sanctions of the ancient covenant, men did not keep it. The promise, “This do, and thou shalt live,” never produced any doing that was worthy to be rewarded with life; and the threatening, “Do this, and thou shalt die,” never kept any man back from daringly venturing into the wrong road which leadeth unto death. The fact is, that the covenant of works, if it be looked upon as a way of safety, is a total failure. No man ever persevered in it unto the end, and no man ever attained unto life by keeping it. (God’s Law in Man’s Heart, HT The Resurgence)

By the works of the law none can be justified, for by that law we are all condemned. Read the Ten Commandments, and pause at each one, and confess that you have broken it either in thought, or word, or deed. Remember that by a glance we may commit adultery, by a thought we may be guilty of murder, by a desire we may steal. Sin is any want of conformity to perfect holiness, and that want of conformity is justly chargeable upon every one of us. Yet the Lord does not, under the gospel dispensation, deal with us according to law. He does not now sit on the throne of judgment, but he looks down upon us from the throne of grace. (The Blood of Sprinkling.)

As it stands now, however, there are significant flaws in the position that Noble appears to hold, especially when this is the time to be clear and precise. The apology seems to reaffirm his claim that the Commandments, even though written as imperatives, are not actually legal rules. This is a paradox that seems difficult to maintain, though maybe we’ll see further clarification from Noble in the next few days.

I had almost finished a response to a post Noble had written yesterday in which he essentially repeated the claims in the sermon. Rather than publishing that today, I will wait and see if he changes yesterday’s post in light of today’s statement.

These aren’t trivial matters, and it’s important that we get them right. If Noble is getting them right, it’s also important to rejoice with him and affirm our unity.

The signs are positive, so let’s take a moment or two to see how things develop.

Everything your pastor says has to be defended by Scripture, and if it’s not, you should lovingly confront your pastor. Scripture is really what matters and we don’t have the right, nor should we have the inclination, to try and change that.

]]>http://www.pajamapages.com/radio-interview-about-nobles-commandments-sermon/feed/0Noble departs Christian orthodoxy, announces he’s staying puthttp://www.pajamapages.com/noble-departs-christian-orthodoxy-announces-hes-staying-put/
http://www.pajamapages.com/noble-departs-christian-orthodoxy-announces-hes-staying-put/#commentsMon, 05 Jan 2015 12:37:08 +0000http://www.pajamapages.com/?p=6148read more]]>Perry Noble took the unprecedented step of directly addressing criticism from the pulpit Sunday morning in response to Rosebrough’s and my critique of his Christmas Eve claim that God told him to preach that the Ten Commandments aren’t commandments. After having a week and a half to reconsider his error, Noble dug in his heels and reaffirmed his assertion that there is no Hebrew word for command. He also walked back NewSpring’s earlier categorical denial that he had ever used the N-word (“Perry doesn’t use that word and doesn’t address anyone in his life by such a word.”), suggesting that we did indeed hear him correctly and that it wasn’t the first time he’d used the word.

Before he addressed the problems with his sermon, Noble took a predictable swipe at his critics.

Fifteen years ago when we started this church, I had no idea that what I was going to do would be this hard. No idea. But I have learned that Christians can be some of the meanest, angriest people on the planet. And so, man, we have people saying…, and you’ve heard me talk about this before. “If you talk about how you don’t love cats again, we’re not coming back to the church. And if you talk about Clemson again, we’re not coming back to the church. And I don’t like it when you say sucks, or crap, or darn, or pissed.” [Laughter and applause.] I had someone email me on social media the other day and say that I cannot bring a friend to our church because I never know what you’re going to say.

And I want to be honest with you guys. I have a pastor’s heart, and my heart is that I wish that I could make everyone in the world happy. But you know what I’ve realized in 15 years of doing this? If I try to make you happy, I become fake. And if I become fake, I become a bad leader of this church. So the promise I’m going to make you as a church [applause] is you get the same guy on stage as you would get at dinner…. [Editor’s note: He doesn’t want to eat dinner with you.]

Listen, church, people are going to attack me. People are going to attack our church and the way that we do church. It’s just going to happen. Recently–I don’t know if you’ve seen this online–but recently there’s been some stuff said about how I say the Ten Commandments (our Christmas Eve services, by the way, were awesome, they were incredible), and some people said that I tried to rescind the Ten Commandments. I didn’t try to rescind the Ten Commandments. I simply declared that they are actually promises from God, because Ten Command…–that word command in Hebrew–it is not command, it is saying. I have resear… I have gone back and talked to people in Israel that confirm those things.

Let me just mention this while I’m at it. There’s been a lot of chatter online this week, and some of you may have seen it, and people saying that I said from this stage the N-word at our Christmas services. You’ve probably seen it. If you haven’t, it’s online; you can go look at it. But listen, don’t fight, don’t fight online. Fighting online is like peeing in the wind; it feels good at first, but everybody gets messy. [Laughter]

If you watch through the video, it looks like I said the N-word. Let me promise you something: that’s not the word that was in my heart. My words got jumbled. It’s not the word that was in my heart. It’s not the word that I wanted to come out of my mouth. It’s not the word that I’ve declared from this stage. My heart is for racial reconciliation. I love all races. Listen, when we get to heaven, every nation, tribe, tongue and language will celebrate who Jesus is together. [Applause] So, let me say this: If you watched that and you felt like I said that word, and you were offended by that, I am deeply sorry. Please know, that’s not what was in my heart, and that’s all we’re going to say about that, and we’re going to move on because we’ve got people to reach for Jesus. Amen? [Applause]

Noble’s statement from the 8:30 a.m. service is noticeably less forceful than their earlier statement that he had never used the N-word. Perhaps because he realized there are too many witnesses to his conversations to sustain an outright denial, Noble seems to concede that he has used that word in private (note the emphasis on not wanting to say it on stage) and that it had accidentally slipped out as he prepared to tell the punchline to the conversation he was having with his friend. My guess is that Noble uses the term affectionately so doesn’t see how using it would make him racist. (I’m not excusing that type of use, just saying that’s probably how Noble sees it.)

One thing I’ll credit Noble for is that as soon as he said it on stage he knew it was a mistake and stopped. He also kind of apologized for it, though he put most of the blame on the listeners who felt like they heard it rather than fully accepting the moral responsibility for having obviously said it. It was also a nice rhetorical flourish to wrap himself in the evangelism flag to put an end to further discussion: Stop talking, we need to win people for Jesus.

There’s much more that could be said about Noble’s N-word problem, though that’s not the biggest problem with his sermon or yesterday’s statement. While he saw his error and apologized for the N-word, Noble continues to see no problem with his rejection of the Ten Commandments, an error that he has now embraced twice (one in the statement from Jan 2, the second from yesterday’s service).

From the outset, I’ve given Noble the benefit of the doubt on how he came to his conclusion that there are not actually any commandments in the Old Testament. The kernel of truth that grew into Noble’s big error was that the Ten Commandments, also known as the Decalogue (ten words), didn’t have a formal title. You can see the outline of what Noble’s Bible tutor was trying to teach him in the Terminology section of this Wikipedia article.

If we stipulate that the Wiki article is correct, we see that the terminology issue is limited to the title of the Commandments. Would Noble say that Boston College, which doesn’t use the word university in its title, isn’t a university like Clemson or USC? Of course not. The nature of the institution is described but not determined by its title. Whatever title anybody gives the Decalogue doesn’t change what they are: commandments.

Now, that’s all interesting, but it’s ultimately irrelevant. The only issue that matters is what the Bible calls the commandments, and it turns out that the Bible calls them commandments. The issue is so blindingly obvious that it seems unnecessary to actually have to spell it out, but people’s willingness to accept or defend Noble’s argument has surprised me, so let’s do this again and let the Bible interpret itself.

And Moses summoned all Israel and said to them, “Hear, O Israel, the statutes and the rules that I speak in your hearing today, and you shall learn them and be careful to do them.” (Deut 5:1)

Now this is the commandment–the statutes and the rules–that the Lord your God commanded me to teach you, that you may do them.

Statutes and rules are an appositive, a restatement or renaming of the word that precedes them. If the Old Testament doesn’t really have a word for command, this verse from Deut 8:1 also becomes impossible to translate or understand:

The whole commandment that I command you today you shall be careful to do.

When we look at the ten commandments themselves, we see that they’re written as imperatives.

You shall have no…, You shall not…, Observe, Honor. (Deut 5:7-21)

The plain grammatical syntax of these verses shows that they’re commands. Looking at the New Testament, Jesus identified them as commands in Matthew 19:17.

If you would enter life, keep the commandments.

Ephesians 6:2 also creates a problem for Noble’s premise.

Honor your father and mother (this is the first commandment with a promise) that it may go well with you and that you may live long in the land.

Paul distinguishes commandments from promises, though he points out that they are sometimes linked. Commandments are not promises, they’re commandments.

Noble’s mistake was to take a little bit of truth and apply it to the entire Old Testament and to each of the ten commandments. For example, he told parents they were wrong to teach that the Bible commanded children to honor their parents. As I argued in my previous post, the larger theological implications of Noble’s error are serious and heretical, which is why I and many others had hoped he’d correct his obvious error.

That he didn’t is a cause for serious concern. Noble preached a sermon that denied the heart of God’s law, which in turn eviscerates the entire gospel and denies the atoning power of Christ. Perhaps Noble departed orthodoxy accidentally, but he has refused the opportunity to come back.

His statement today suggests that he knows he’s wrong but he doesn’t dare discover the truth. Look again at Noble’s “defense” of his sermon:

[The Commandments] are actually promises from God, because Ten Command…–that word command in Hebrew–it is not command, it is saying. I have resear… I have gone back and talked to people in Israel that confirm those things.

He starts to say that he researched the term, but can’t quite bring himself to use that word. Instead of research, he went back to the source of his error–his friends in Israel. It’s as if he didn’t want to find any information that would undermine his thesis. Start with the desired conclusion, then work furiously to avoid anything that would contradict it. G.K. Chesterton described Noble’s behavior well: “To be wrong, and to be carefully wrong, that is the definition of decadence.”

It would expose his weakness as a preacher

He readily acknowledges his ignorance of Hebrew, which is why he reacts so credulously to his Israeli driver. Noble mocks serious theological education and boasts about walking away from seminary himself. A mix of his willful ignorance of the biblical languages and of church history was the toxic stew that helped produce his sermon. (Shouldn’t it have given him pause that he was rejecting the label that Protestants have always used for the commandments?)

Those who would preach God’s Word have a serious, terrible responsibility. To get it right requires much effort and study. In the Old Testament, the Levites prepared for the priesthood from birth and couldn’t start their priestly duties until they turned 30. Paul commends Timothy (2 Tim 3) for having learned Scripture from his childhood, yet commanded him to continue to study it as a workman so he would be ready to preach. Such serious preparation was required, Paul says, because other preachers would arise who would preach unsound doctrine.

Peter had the same concern about the harm that would be wrought by unlearned teachers.

Our beloved brother Paul also wrote to you according to the wisdom given him, as he does in all his letters when he speaks in them of these matters. There are some things in them that are hard to understand, which the ignorant and unstable twist to their own destruction, as they do the other Scriptures. (2 Peter 3:15-16)

A pastor’s ignorance of Scripture is not an excuse, it’s a threat.

It would undermine his salvation statistics

Noble got on his knees to beg people to say yes to Jesus after revising the Ten Commandments

After Noble’s sermon, he pleaded for the unsaved to come forward to say yes to Jesus, something that Noble assumed signaled their conversion to Christianity. What would happen if Noble now renounced his entire sermon? Should the people who accepted his argument still be considered saved, given that they had actually heard a message that rejected the gospel? How do you issue a recall on an altar call?

He really does want to redefine Christianity

Friends of Noble have defended the Commandments sermon by suggesting that we’re overreacting and taking his lesson out of context. Noble actually provided the context at the beginning of his sermon.

It all starts with the word yes... Have you really said yes to God?…

There are two main objections that people have to becoming a Christian. One is that they’ve met some Christians, and I understand. Listen. We–because I’m a Christian–we can be weird people sometimes. We can say some dumb things. We can say some stupid things. We can say some insensitive things. Yes, we have been weird, but please don’t think God is weird because his people are…

But number two–and this is the biggest thing that people tell me. They say, “Perry, I don’t feel like I could do what it takes to be a Christian. I don’t feel like I could keep all the rules. I don’t feel like I could keep all the regulations. I don’t feel like I could keep the commandments. And, so because I can’t do it well I’m not even going to try because I would rather not try than to try at something and fail.”

And there are people here tonight that you’ve said no to Jesus for so long because you feel like you would fail, you would mess up, you couldn’t do it right. It goes back to this idea that in the Bible there’s these things called the Ten Commandments.

You ever heard of those? Even if you’re a non-christian, you’ve heard of the Ten Commandments. Now it became real interesting to me–and this is the reason that I think you need to say yes to Jesus tonight–because earlier this year I was in Israel…

[The story of his driver’s lesson about the Ten Commandment follows.]

Instead of Ten Commandments that you have to keep if you’re going to be a follower of Jesus, they’re actually ten promises that you can receive when you say yes to Jesus. So what I want to do tonight is I just want to go through each one of them very quickly….I am trying my best to convince you to say yes to Jesus because of these ten promises.

After describing God’s family as an embarrassment, he gets to the heart of the issue. If nonbelievers are repelled by God’s law, it’s really OK. There is no such thing as God’s law. God is really just a soft bucket of puppies and kittens that you’ll really, really enjoy. Noble is revising the Ten Commandments because God’s enemies don’t like them.

Noble is creating a religion that is going to be acceptable to people who can continue in their rebellion against God’s law. Rather than being broken by the law and rescued by Christ (see Romans 7), Noble is preaching an anti-Christian message that embraces a revulsion towards God’s law and God’s family.

This is why Noble needs to repent publicly and quickly. He has sold a false religion to his flock, many of whom may have no reason to examine the state of their salvation (Philippians 2:12).

We take no joy in seeing Noble persist in his error, though this Commandments sermon has provided many with a moment of clarity over the danger of his preaching. I fear for Noble, who in the last few weeks has denied that the early church had a Bible, said that homosexuality is no more sinful than obesity, and has now rejected the Ten Commandments. The trajectory is ominous.

Noble has lived on the boundaries of orthodoxy for a long time, but he has departed it now and is advocating a non-christian gospel. For the sake of the people who continue to follow Noble, we pray that he repents and comes back.

(P.S. I did privately contact Noble last week recommending that he repent and correct his Christmas Eve sermon. His statement today was his response.)